


Jack in the Box

by GinAndCats



Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, MLM WLW solidarity, ben mentioned in passing, dead lovers, liberties taken
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-17
Updated: 2018-01-17
Packaged: 2019-03-05 20:48:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13395942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GinAndCats/pseuds/GinAndCats
Summary: A DIRECT continuation of episode Sixty-Six; when I say direct I mean like, it picks off from the last line of the episode.Sammy and Lily finally have a heart to heart about the man they both loved: Jack Wright.





	Jack in the Box

**Author's Note:**

> hi, im on a lot of cold medicine and wrote this- i hope you like it
> 
> btw before episode 66 came out i kinda felt Sammy and The Dark could maybe become, y'konw, an item? just a thought- love jack tho, love how we know nothing abot him

The air stagnated for a moment, for a brief period the listeners of King Falls AM could hear nothing but radio static and impassioned breathing. 

“... you shouldn’t have called, Lily.” Sammy was hunched over the console, one hand placed firmly over his eyes and the other holding that damned phone. He should hang up, he knows he should hang up, but that wouldn’t fix anything, and he knows she’ll keep calling in until he cracks. So he does- or at least begins to.

“You didn’t hang up.” She sounded surprised, and just a bit out of breath from her previous comments. Sammy doesn’t bother answering her, he just stays hunched over his desk; trying to block out the light, and the noise, because everything is just too goddamn much right now. “What? Are you running away from this conversation too? You don’t have any snarky comments to bat into my field? This is unbelievable-”

Sammy grits his teeth and tries to ignore his growing anger, an anger he had bottled up and locked deep inside him long ago. He knew his breath was getting labored and he knew that he was live on air, but he was seeing white and couldn’t make sense of anything, much less make a rational decision.

“What was your plan, huh? Figured you’d just move away from all your problems and set up shop here, of all places?! How long did you think you’d last here? One year? Maybe two- three if you got really lucky? You know sometimes I pity you, you never face anything that’s too hard, or painful for you. Is it nice, getting to live a happy life, like he never existed at all?” It feels like he took a cannon to the chest when she says those words. He keeps trying to sit still, he keeps trying to listen like he should have years ago. But he doesn’t know if he can take it; maybe deep down he knows he is nothing but a pathetic quitter, because that’s all he wants to do right now; he wants to quit and hang up and go home, where he doesn’t have to face this. Still, he tries to endure it, he tries to calm down enough to speak, he tries not to panic and run away; for him.

“You know what the hardest part for me was?” She doesn’t bother waiting for an answer, “Having to hear from all the lovely townsfolk about what a great pair you and your New Jack-”

“He isn’t my new Jack!” his voice comes out cracked, and desperate, and hoarse. He can feel tears now start to make their way down his face. His chest feels like it’s on fire, it feels like his sternum is trying to rip itself apart so that the pain could flow out of his body, because no body should be able to feel this much. “No one… could replace him.” 

And no one ever will, Sammy thinks to himself. He doesn’t apologize for yelling, or causing a scene, he doesn’t even try to fight back either. If he’s being honest most of his fight left when Jack disappeared. Ben helped fill the void a bit but he wasn’t the same, he could never be the same. Sammy didn’t want him to be the same. 

“You … said his name.” Any bite or malice that she had been speaking with before had subsided. Her own voice was getting rough from all the emotion in the exchange. Sammy was shaking, he tried pushing his free hand against the desk as hard as he could, but it still wasn’t enough to stop the dissonant tapping. 

“What do you want from me?” after taking a deep breath he tries to face up to her. Half choked back sobs pepper the short phrase. Sammy wanted to be finished with this, whatever it was she wanted he’d give, there was nothing that could be worth this hell. Lily doesn’t respond right away, Sammy hears her try and fail to start a sentence as he waits. He sweats in anticipation, dreading what she’s going to say.

“I want-” she croaks, sniffling, “I want to know why you ran away from me, from everyone. I want to know why you came here.” Lily sounded sincere, and concerned, like this was something she’d wanted to ask for a long time. Hell, it probably was. It wasn’t an easy question for Sammy to answer, most days he asks himself the same thing, why he puts himself through this. 

“Don’t you already know?” He tries to deflect, tries to put the burden of conversation back on her. He doesn’t want to talk about this stuff, he can’t talk about this stuff, it hurts far too much. He would prefer for Lily to go back to yelling at him, to go back to hating him. Because he can deal with hate, but not this, not disappointment. 

“Sammy.” She pleads insistently, starting to sound as broken as he feels. But when he tries to find the words he can’t, it’s like the truth in locked inside him and he doesn’t have the security clearance to reach it. He tries to pull from different thoughts and memories that are now racing through his mind. 

“I came here,” he stops to take a steadying breath, licking his lips nervously, “To feel closer to him, to be closer… to him.” He says it softly like a prayer, so quietly that he’s not even sure Lily could hear it through the phone. But she must have heard something because he hears a reflective hiss, as if she had been physically hit with his soft confession. On the other end of the phone he can hear her crying, but it’s muffled, like she has her hand over her mouth. And even though Lily Wright is the last person he wants to be with in this situation, he finds himself crying with her.  
They both don’t talk for a while, but neither of them hang up either. After he gets acclimated to it, it doesn’t feel all that bad, to be sharing this pain with someone. For so long it was him and Jack; and then for so long after that it was just him. He’d tried to reach out to Lily at first, but his voice wasn’t the one she needed to hear- so it became him, alone. He knows he resents Lily, he knows he envies that she could always keep going through something that was tearing him apart. He had hated how she wouldn’t listen, and how she could so definitely make her mind up about something. He hated that so often she was right, that she could see through him to the person he really was. He hated all that; but he never could hate her as a whole. He guesses that would’ve been too easy for him, and this world doesn’t intend for him to have an easy time. 

“Can I come up?” she breaks the silence with her hoarse voice, “To the station I mean?”

“I don’t…” he doesn’t finish his sentence, he still feels the urge to hang up and wash his hands of this, but an equal if not bigger part of himself needs the company right now.

“Please, just please. Let me help you,” she gets choked up, “Help me.” 

“You aren’t even in King Falls right now, you went on hiatus weeks ago.” He can hear her almost chuckle at this.

“I said I wasn’t a quitter, didn’t I?” she jokes, sort of sad and resigned. After so much happening Sammy doesn’t piece together what she means right away.

“I’m not following.” He rubs his temple, knowing he’s going to have a hell of a headache later. 

“Well, I couldn’t fault my crew for going home, but I also don’t leave things unfinished. Someone disappeared, on my watch, I can’t just leave that alone. I’m staying in thee town over for the time being, Big Pine? Just so I can, uh, keep an eye on things here.” Instead of her usual boastfulness she actually sounded sort of sheepish. Like even she thought this independent investigation wasn’t the best idea. But Sammy had to hand it to her, she always has seen things through to the end, a department she has clearly gotten him beat in. He sighs, starting to give in even more than before

“Okay. I guess it couldn’t hurt-” she doesn’t even let him finish before she responds. 

“I’ll be there in fifteen.” With the line finally dead, Sammy takes what few moments he now had alone to collect himself. He splashed some cool water on his face and unashamedly used his smartphone as a mirror to fix his hair. But even with taking time to regain his composure it seems Lily is there far too soon. 

“How professional, pajamas?” Sammy tries to joke, commenting on the loudly patterned Minnie Mouse pants. She gives him a wry smile in return and sits in the chair Ben usually occupies. It’s an uncomfortable few minutes at first, the flow of their conversation having been irreparably broken by a fifteen minute car ride. It’s eventually Lily who speaks first, because of course it is. Lily was the one who cooked the meal and set the table, Sammy was doing his best just to show up at the table. 

“I know it’s been hard for you, and I know you’re hurt by it, but you can’t keep acting like you’re the only one- he- Jack- I looked up to him, our dad was never around so he was that man for me. Jack was my brother, my only brother.” Sammy bites his lip to contain the sob that wells up in him every time he hears his name. He doesn’t look Lily in the eye, he can’t. 

“He was my everything.” He says plainly, already feeling his newly regained composure slipping, and slipping fast. Lily is quiet for a moment, but it isn’t a harsh silence. She moves herself into a position where she’s looking Sammy straight in the eyes. He can see that she’s letting her own tears flow freely, staining her sweatshirt a darker gray when they drip off her face. 

“I know.” She says it with such assurance, like she was saying the sky is blue. “You were his.”

He finally breaks, letting his body convulse and shake with sobs and howls of genuine pain that he had been avoiding for years. He doubles over in his chair, finally feeling the empty air around him where Jack used to be. He just misses him so much. If only he could see him again, just so he could tell him he loved him one last time. 

Lily pats his back, letting him feel his pain, because it’s her pain too. Jack was important to both of them, and both of them are lost without Jack. But they both do notice, the sting of misery isn’t as bad when you’re not alone. 

They cry together, and sit together, supporting each other, looking to the other for support. 

“I haven’t cried like that since, well, you know.” Sammy does know, he hadn’t cried like that since Jack had disappeared either. 

“I’m sorry what I said before, about Ben.” Sammy nods, but doesn’t answer her right away, “I was just hurt and angry at you for running away all this time, and seeing you treat another guy the same way you treated my brother, felt cheap.” Lily tried to find words that would convey her feelings without attacking.

“Okay, point taken, but Ben isn’t a ‘New Jack’. I don’t want a new Jack- honestly I don’t think anyone could handle more than one Jack… He was a once in a lifetime man. And I never intend to let anyone take that spot from him.” Lily nodded, getting misty eyed. Sammy knew she agreed with him, Jack wasn’t- isn’t- the kind of person you can replace. He was once in a lifetime, and there’s nothing that can hold a candle to him.

Getting hot, Lily removes her sweatshirt. Sammy thought that what’s underneath was almost cruel. She notices his staring and looks down at the shirt herself, she quickly looks back up with a bittersweet expression. 

“I still sleep in his old t-shirts all the time. It’s what makes me feel … closer.” She was wearing an old ring toss shirt, one Jack had gotten at a county fair years ago. “I’m sure you have some of his shirts too.” 

He does, and they’re some of his most prized possessions; but the one Lily’s wearing in particular makes him laugh. 

“You know, I won that for him.” He didn’t think he’d ever told anyone this story, since he and Jack were technically supposed to be working the day they went to the carnival.

“Oh?” It seemed clear that Lily did not know this fact.

“Well, bought more than won. Turns out even carnies will pity you after you sink nearly fifty good ones into stupid ring toss game.” Lily smiled, still wiping tears from her face. Even if he didn’t want to, Sammy now found himself lost in memories of Jack. “He used to joke that it’s the most expensive shirt he has, but I’d tell him it was the ugliest. But he still wore it, as often as he could. He wore it under a suit once when we went to meet with upper management; said it felt like a silent rebellion against the man. The goofball.” 

Sammy was, surprised at all this that was now flowing so easily from him. It hurt to remember, and it’ll always hurt to remember, but he was smiling too. Sammy and Lily leaned into this and for a little while reminisced about good times with Jack. After a while, it did become too much though,

“You think maybe we can stop here for today, I don’t think my heart can take much more.” He could clearly see that Lily had so much more to talk about, but she backed off.

“Sure, I’m just glad you’re finally open to talking” They sit again together, for a while, in comfortable silence.

But then the hotline rings.

“I better get this,” Sammy takes another quick steadying breath before picking up the phone. “Hello?”

“Uh, hey Sammy, it’s Troy.” He speaks with his usual southern drawl

“Hey Troy! And what can I do for ya’ tonight?” Sammy tries as hard as he can to sound like he didn’t spend the better half of an hour sobbing. 

“Well, actually I was thinking of what I could do for you, buddy.”

“Not sure I follow, Troy.” Troy hesitates a moment before answering back.

“Now I don’t mean to make any assumptions, and I won’t pry into your personal business if you don’t want me to … but y’all’ve been live this whole time.”

 

“Fuck.”


End file.
